Ethernet is no longer an option for Industrial Devices – ETHERNET IS A REQUIREMENT. Ethernet is the fastest growing segment of Industrial Networking for one reason – The Market (Your Customers) Loves Ethernet. And the most important Industrial Ethernet protocol is EtherNet/IP™. EtherNet/IP is the Ethernet solution used in the Rockwell Automation architecture and the one GM is requiring for Robots, Welders and other automation devices.
Even though Ethernet is the standard there is still an awful lot of raw TCP data out there. There is a ton of perfectly good scales, barcode readers, RF ID stuff and lots of other things that generate a TCP string. This is equipment that you've used for a long time. You know how to set it up, how to make it work and that it's reliable for you. Plus, you can probably get it a really good price since it doesn't have all the fancy features of the new models.
The problem is that you still have to get this stuff into your PLC. And front panel serial ports are going the same way as PC serial ports. So, you've probably used these serial tunneling devices. They work fine to a point. You still have to receive the serial data and move it into PLC registers. That means writing and testing plc logic. Not hard – just another task to do and more code to support. But there is a better way, a much better way. If you could move the data right into the PLCs registers it would not only save you commissioning time, it get your barcode or scale data into those registers faster without any overhead.
Well, that's the device that we have. It quickly and easily moves Barcode data, Weigh Scale data and other TCP devices to ControlLogix PLCs using EtherNet/IP. Using EtherNet/IP Client technology the 490NBA EtherNet/IP gateway moves your raw TCP data to a ControlLogix PLC with little or no delay. Milliseconds after receiving your raw TCP data on either of the two serial ports your data is transferred to your user-specified tag in the PLC. Simply configure the input data format, the IP Address of the ControlLogix PLC and a PLC tag for each serial port using a very simply browser interface and you are ready to run. No standalone or custom software is required. It's that simple!
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